Abortion 'being used as contraception'

Abortions are being used as a form of contraception, according to Lord Steel, the architect of the current laws on terminations.

Lord Steel, who introduced the 1967 Abortion Act as a private members Bill, said there are too many abortions.Woman are turning to the procedure "if things go wrong", he said.

There were more than 194,000 terminations in England and Wales last year, an increase of four per cent on the previous year.

"Everybody can agree that there are too many abortions," Lord Steel said. "I accept that there is a mood now which is that if things go wrong you can get an abortion, and it is irresponsible really. People should be more responsible in their activities and in particular in the use of contraception.

"There is a view that particularly those who are present for repeated abortions are treating it as a 'long stop' contraception."

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The Catholic church's opposition to contraception was "contributing to the use of abortion as a contraception", he said in an interview with The Guardian.

He also said that he was not yet convinced that the upper legal time for terminations should be cut from 24 weeks.

This view is to be echoed today by the Government, in a move that has infuriated pro-life campaigners. Dawn Primarolo, the public health minister, will tell a cross-party Commons committee of MPs that there is no evidence to support a change in the law.

"Ministers are cherry picking the evidence to support their pro-choice stance," said Julia Millington, the political director of the ProLife Alliance.

"There has been a reluctance to consider the improvement in the survival rates of babies born before 24 weeks."

MPs on the Science and Technology Committee are examining whether the upper time limit of 24 weeks for an abortion should be reduced.

The inquiry was partly provoked by three-dimensional scans of 12-week-old foetuses, which showed them apparently smiling and crying.